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Forums
Physics
Classical Physics
Electromagnetism
Transmission line voltage delay
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[QUOTE="Mister T, post: 5887414, member: 572021"] It's the electric field that takes time to travel. In a vacuum it travels at the speed of light, in a wire almost as fast. That's the reason for the signal delay. In a wire the charge carriers (electrons) respond to this field and move. Think of it as a command to move. The command itself moves down the wire at, like I said, almost the speed of light. When the command arrives the electrons move, but they move at a much much slower speed than the command. An analogy is a line of soldiers, in single file. From near the rear of the line the sergeant shouts the command "march". All the soldiers start moving at almost the same time, but there's a slight delay for soldiers near the front of the line because the command travels to them at the speed of sound. The soldiers march at a much slower speed than the speed at which the command travels. Saying that "a current takes time to travel" doesn't make sense to me. Current is the rate at which charge moves, so I can't understand what it would mean for current to travel. [/QUOTE]
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Physics
Classical Physics
Electromagnetism
Transmission line voltage delay
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